Copyright Basics

Musical compositions are protected by U.S. copyright laws under the U.S. Copyright Act. The copyright law states:

“Copyright is a form of protection provided by the laws of the United States (title 17, U.S. Code) to the authors of ‘original works of authorship,’ including literary, dramatic, musical, artistic, and certain other intellectual works.”

This protection is available to both published and unpublished works and lasts for the author’s life, plus 70 years.

Section 106 of the 1976 Copyright Act gives the owner of copyright the exclusive right to do and to authorize others to do the following:

To reproduce the work in copies or phonorecords;

To prepare derivative works based upon the work;

To distribute copies or phonorecords of the work to the public by sale or other transfer of ownership, or by rental, lease, or lending;

To perform the work publicly, in the case of literary, musical, dramatic, and choreographic works, pantomimes, and motion pictures and other audiovisual works;

To display the copyrighted work publicly, in the case of literary, musical, dramatic, and choreographic works, pantomimes, and pictorial, graphic, or sculptural works, including the individual images of a motion picture or other audiovisual work; and

In the case of sound recordings, to perform the work publicly by means of a digital audio transmission.

As the creator and owner of a composition or song, you are in control of these rights and are free to grant these rights to others. This is most commonly done through licensing.

Licensing allows music users such as record labels, TV and film production companies and advertising agencies the rights to use your work, in exchange for compensation of some kind.

When Is Music Protected By Copyright?

“Copyright protection subsists from the time the work is created in fixed form. The copyright in the work of authorship immediately becomes the property of the author who created the work.

Only the author or those deriving their rights through the author can rightfully claim copyright.”

What that means that as soon as it exists on paper, recorded on a sound file or stored on a computer it’s protected under copyright law.

Composition Copyrights

When you create a new musical work and put it in some tangible form, you get copyright to the musical composition.

The musical composition consists of the notes, melody, chords and lyrics that make up the work.

Sound Recording Copyrights

When you create a new musical work and record it, two separate copyrights are created, one each for:

the actual music composition

the sound recording of that music composition

Master Recording

The sound recording is your recorded version of the composition and is frequently referred to as the master recording.

It’s important to understand that there can be multiple sound recordings of a music composition. For example, The Beatles’ recording of “A Hard Day’s Night” is one, and Alvin and the Chipmunks’ recording of the song is another.

Note: Alvin and the Chipmunks had to get a license to be able to record and release their version of the song legally.

Copyright Registration

It’s important to know that your work is copyrighted even if you do not register it with the U.S. Copyright Office.

Registering a musical work is recommended as it gives you additional protections that an unregistered work does not receive, such as:

a public record of the copyright claim

the ability to file an infringement suit in court

statutory damages and attorney’s fees reimbursement in court actions

Poor Man’s Copyright

To save money, budget-minded composers and songwriters have tried using the “poor man’s copyright” method of mailing a certified copy of the work to themselves and leaving it unopened.

The idea is that the postmark will provide proof of date of authorship.

According to the Copyright Office, “… there is no provision in the copyright law regarding any such type of protection, and it is not a substitute for registration”.

You also lose all the additional protections listed above if you use this method, so it’s not recommended.

Notice of Copyright

Though it’s not a legal requirement to post a notice of copyright to a work, it’s recommended that you do.

The proper way to post copyright notice is illustrated in this example:

How To File A Copyright Registration

A Single Application for one song with music and/or lyrics with only one author and owner can be filed online for $35.00. You can register both the music composition and the sound recording at the same time.

A Standard Application must be used if there is more than one author or owner. The online filing fee is also $35.00. You can register both the music composition and the sound recording at the same time.

You will also have to upload a copy of the work. Acceptable formats are:

.doc

.docx

PDF

mp3

.aif

.wav

The preferred audio format is mp3 as it will have the smallest size and the website has some file size limitations.

Application Filing Time

Due to the volume of applications, it can take up to 8 months to hear back from the Copyright Office that your registration is completed!

Registering Multiple Works

If the idea of spending hundreds of dollars registering your works doesn’t sit well with you, know that it’s possible to register a collection of works for one price.

About The Author

Michael is a veteran award-winning composer, publisher, and producer. He is the owner of The Music Kitchen and Audio Addiction Music Library, a production music library with worldwide distribution. You can learn more about him on the About page.